Wednesday, June 03, 2015

Case-or-Controversy Limits and Qualified Immunity

by Michael Dorf
My latest Verdict column discusses the Supreme Court's per curiam decision on Monday in Taylor v. Barkes. The decision reverses a Third Circuit ruling that permitted the widow of a man who killed himself in jail to sue the warden and the head of the state prison administration for failure to adequately train and supervise hired medical staff in evaluating detainees for suicide risk. In light of a conflict in the lower courts and the absence of any SCOTUS precedent recognizing a right to be subject to an adequate suicide prevention protocol, the Court in Barkes holds that the defendants were entitled to qualified immunity (QI).

Without disagreeing with the result per se,I use the Barkes per curiam as an opportunity to criticize various aspects of the Court's QI jurisprudence, including its 2009 decision in Pearson v. Callahan, which overruled the "rigid order of battle" of Saucier v. Katz. In Saucier, the Court had said that when faced with a QI defense, a court ought to first consider whether the plaintiff's claim, if proven, would amount to a constitutional violation. Only if so should the court then consider QI. The rationale for Saucier was that by considering QI w/o first addresing the substantive merits, the courts stunt the development of constitutional law. A decision holding only that a right was not clearly established means that the putative right will be no more (or less) clearly established in the next case. The column questions the reasons given in Pearson for thinking that this phenomenon will be adequately addressed by claims arising in other contexts.

One argument I do not address in the column--but that one sometimes hears in discussions of Saucier--is that the Saucier procedure violates the case-or-controversy norm of Article III. The argument goes like this: If a court is ultimately going to decide a case in favor of the defendant on QI grounds, then the preliminary determination that the plaintiff's constitutional rights were violated is advisory; accordingly, a court should consider QI first; if there is QI, game over; and if there isn't QI because the right at issue was clearly established, then a fortiori there is a constitutional right; thus there is no need to consider the substantive right question at all, and a court shouldn't risk deciding it as an advisory opinion.

I think that the foregoing argument is overstated. Part of the argument for the approach in Saucier is that it makes more sense logically to address the substantive right question first, even if the court ultimately rejects the claim on QI grounds, because addressing the substantive right question will frame the QI inquiry. Moreover, until the court actually finds QI, the substantive right question could have an impact on the outcome, and is therefore not advisory. A ruling doesn't become advisory post hoc. It's only advisory if it is known that it can have no effect on the outcome when the court is considering the question.

Nonetheless, there is a narrower version of the case-or-controversy objection that has some greater force. This narrower version acknowledges that a federal court has the power to consider the substantive right question first but then objects that a ruling in favor of the substantive right will end up being mere dicta if the court next finds that the defendant is entitled to QI. Although there are numerous approaches to distinguishing between holdings and dicta, a standard one defines dicta as a statement that does not state a proposition that is in any way necessary to the holding. If the holding is that the defendant has QI, then a statement that the defendant nonetheless violated the plaintiff's rights surely qualifies as dicta under this standard.

I should be clear that this "it's only dicta" objection is not made by the SCOTUS in Pearson, which leaves district court judges with discretion to address the substantive merits of a claim before the QI issue. So either the SCOTUS thinks that the substantive merits ruling in these circumstances is not dicta or that, if it is dicta, it's justified dicta.

To my mind, each of those positions is plausible. Another definition of dicta is that it's a kind of gratuitous aside. This approach narrows the category of dicta and correspondingly expands the category of holding. A very limited view of the function of the courts would say that the broader approach to holdings threatens case-or-controversy/separation-of-powers values because it gives courts lawmaking powers that go beyond the scope of the particular case. While there is something to that objection, taken too seriously it swallows itself. After all, if courts restrict their statements to those truly necessary to the outcome, they cannot make law at all. They can only say "plaintiff wins" or "defendant wins."

The whole idea of QI strikes me as cutting against the narrow view of courts' lawmaking power. As I discuss in the column, QI rests on the premise that government officials ought not to have to answer in damages for guessing wrong about the lawfulness of their conduct. But that particular bit of legal realism about the limits of the law's determinacy accepts that judicial decisions either do or do not clearly establish legal rules and standards over time. Put differently, QI itself is a response to the fact of judicial lawmaking. It would thus be ironic to limit a court's capacity to clarify the law in the course of a QI case on the ground that judicial lawmaking is illegitimate.

9 comments:

The column notes that the reading of a certain statute goes beyond its text.

Is Scalia on the case? Qualified immunity brings to mind the writings of people like Prof. Akhil Amar who are supportive of broad discretion for juries (he supports liability over the exclusionary rule as I understand it; former prosecutors like Tom Clark didn't see that as a credible solution in the real world), arguing that the "original understanding" supported that sort of thing. Who knows -- I understand things changed there.

But, people like Justice Thomas should be worried about that sort of thing.

The rationale for the non-textual QI (a doctrine which predates Justice Scalia's arrival on the Court) is that the Congress that enacted Sec. 1983 did so against the common-law background, which included official immunity. This is similar to the inference that federal crimes are subject to common-law defenses (like self-defense) even though Title 18 of the U.S. Code does not list such defenses.

Thanks. The issue is complex, I realize, but my basic understanding is that official immunity has been expanded over our history, and was not as broad at the Founding. Again, FWIW. Also, part of the charm of common law is its ability to develop. Scalia et. al. seems to have a selective respect to that sort of thing.

Ironically, it seems like the "Policy or Practice" restriction on suing municipalities is the real problem with QI. Ultimately, if someone's rights are violated by "the government" then "the government" should be held responsible. However the result of these two doctrines combined is that if an employee of the government, who the government has supervisory authority over, acts in a way that was against "policy or practice" then there is no one for the wronged individual to recover damages from. Even worse, the same excuse of not being established law continues to work if another individual is wronged in the same way.

I'm generally for qualified immunity, but this should just shift responsibility from the accused to the municipality (ironically, what the indemnification clauses in contracts do.) I'm not sure that qualified immunity is really the problem, so much as the "policy or practice" restriction is. Unfortunately, it appear that this is a problem calling for a legislative solution that will never happen.

Either that, or practice should include actions by individuals for whom the municipality has supervisory authority. I believe this is how actions by employees of businesses are handled, isn't it?

Am here to testify what this great spell caster done for me. i never believe in spell casting, until when i was was tempted to try it. i and my husband have been having a lot of problem living together, he will always not make me happy because he have fallen in love with another lady outside our relationship, i tried my best to make sure that my husband leave this woman but the more i talk to him the more he makes me fell sad, so my marriage is now leading to divorce because he no longer gives me attention. so with all this pain and agony, i decided to contact this spell caster to see if things can work out between me and my husband again. this spell caster who was a woman told me that my husband is really under a great spell that he have been charm by some magic, so she told me that she was going to make all things normal back. she did the spell on my husband and after 5 days my husband changed completely he even apologize with the way he treated me that he was not him self, i really thank this woman her name is Dr Aluta she have bring back my husband back to me i want you all to contact her who are having any problem related to marriage issue and relationship problem she will solve it for you. her email is traditionalspellhospital@gmail.com she is a woman and she is great. wish you good time.He cast spells for different purposes like(1) If you want your ex back.(2) if you always have bad dream(3) You want to be promoted in your office.(4) You want women/men to run after you.(5) If you want a child.(6) You want to be rich.(7) You want to tie your husband/wife to be yours forever.(8) If you need financial assistance.(9) HIV/AIDS CURE(10) is the only answer to that your problem of winning the lottery

I feel the same way as any other woman with heartbreak and What would I have done if not for DR. kaka, my name is Mrs. Robin Wendy, I am 38. years old and I have a son. Unfortunately almost a year ago his father broke up with me because of a mistake I made and I just really want.him back. He is the best thing that has ever happened to me and I want.our family to be complete again, I want to spend the rest of my life with him. I read online that he helped a girl in this situation and I contacted him for help. I grew up with my parents divorced and I don't want that for my son and I miss my husband so much and just want our family to be whole again I want the love of my life back and I can honestly say that because he is the only man I have ever truly loved with all my heart. So I seek help from kakasolutiontemple@gmail.com and he responded to me and he cast a love spell for me which I use in getting back my husband and I am happy and grateful to him for helping me and I want you all to also have the opportunity I had also,kakasolutiontemple@gmail.com is the only through help I have ever known. Good luck” you can call the great man on +2348161554365 his ready to help you with your problem.